An America First Energy Policy

By Marc Morano and Adam Houser

Regardless of your views on man-made climate change, it is clear that America’s current energy policies are not working.

Gas prices have surged and dependence on foreign sources of energy is increasing. Russian oil imports reached an 11 year high before the ban, and President Joe Biden is being forced to beg OPEC for more oil.

Despite massive investments from federal, state, and local governments, wind and solar still only provide about 10 to 11 percent of our electricity. Areas overly reliant on wind and solar, like California and Texas, are increasingly experiencing disastrous blackouts.

‘New Way Forward’

America needs a new way forward.

Banning energy that powers America, especially fossil fuels and nuclear, while mandating the premature use of energy like wind and solar that is clearly not ready to replace them is immoral and irrational. Energy advocates should unapologetically advance the moral case for cheap and abundant domestic fossil fuels.

We need an innovative free-market approach to environmental policy.

Americans want environmental and energy policies focused on innovation, technology, and efficiency. Policies that encourage growth should be pursued, because, despite what many environmentalists assert, when a society grows richer and has abundant energy it takes better care of its environment.

Supporters of Rational Energy Policies

In 2021, MIT climate scientist Richard Lindzen, Ph.D. said, “I think that most of these people realize that there is nothing that the U.S. and Europe can do that will have a discernible impact on climate regardless of what one believes about climate.”

“Under the circumstances, the rational policy would be to do everything possible to increase the wealth of their societies in order to maximize resilience to whatever nature might do for whatever reason,” Lindzen continued.

While statistician Bjørn Lomborg, Ph.D. noted the benefits of economic development for environmental quality saying, “[f]or the most important environmental issues, economic growth has solved problems, not created them. The cleanest places are not the poorest countries, but the richer economies that have cleaned up their act.”

Legislators should seek all opportunities to expand of U.S. energy production and infrastructure, and safeguard domestic energy against stringent regulations that are based not on science, but on lobbyists’ goals and climate activists’ claims.

Legislators need to approve pipelines, support fracking expansion, keep coal plants running, support oil drilling and all manner of energy production that would help make America less dependent on Russian, Chinese, Iranian or Venezuelan energy. In short, stop outsourcing pollution to nations with lower environmental standards than ours and horrible human rights records.

Specific Policies to Pursue

Part of formulating a sound domestic energy policy would be for the United States to establish an “Ethical Energy Index.”

Under this policy, companies that obtain resources from nations with questionable human rights records, lax environmental standards or poor enforcement, and authoritarian regimes would be ineligible for ethical energy certification. For example, companies bringing in oil from OPEC countries, solar, panels, batteries, wind turbines that use minerals from the Congo and China, for instance—which produces radioactive sludge lakes and mine runoffs— and energy from Iran, Russia, Venezuela, and the like Russia, Iran, etc., would be ineligible for the certification.

Most ethically certifiable companies would be either U.S. nuclear, coal, oil, and natural gas producers, or Canadian, Mexican, and European producers.

Large oil companies operating in countries with questionable records would also be ineligible. This would give consumers knowledge, empowering them to make ethical decisions concerning what energy sources they should or should not support with their purchases.

Mining Critical Minerals

Advancing American energy independence also demands speeding up the mine approval process in the United States for rare earths other vital minerals and metals critical to modern technologies.

America must challenge China’s near-monopoly over rare-Earth production both in China and Africa, and not just for solar and wind but also for lithium batteries, cell phones, and other electronics and military equipment, as well.

Where deposits do exist, mine it here where environmental standards are stricter.

Solar Reforms

In many states, wealthy homeowners install solar panels because they receive a tax credit, and then the utility company is forced to buy the electricity they generate, usually at retail rates.

The cost of this less-efficient electricity is then shouldered by ratepayers, of which lower-income ratepayers share the biggest burden.

This “welfare for the wealthy” should end. Utilities should no longer be required to purchase electricity generated on the roofs of the wealthy.

Other Valuable Reforms

Congress or state legislatures or both need to implement tort reform to stop frivolous lawsuits whose sole purpose is to delay infrastructure projects, including mining projects that make wind and solar possible. Environmental groups often advocate for “renewable” energy only to then oppose the mining needed to make it possible.

In addition, the the Nuclear Regulatory Commission should be reformed to facilitate the timely and cost-effective construction of the next generation nuclear power plants.

Congress must also reform the permitting process at the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, so it is permitting more dams rather than mandating existing dams removal.

Congress should also embrace Endangered Species Act reform, to enable private property owners to develop or protect their land without fear of federal sanctions. The history of energy development across the nation proves beyond a shadow of a doubt that oil and gas production and beloved species can co-exist.

With our national security at stake, the time for a rational and ethical energy policy has arrived. Let’s move forward.

Marc Morano (morano@climatedepot.com) is the publisher of CFACT’s award-winning ClimateDepot.com and the author of Green Fraud. Adam Houser (ahouser@cfactcampus.org) directs CFACT’s National Collegians program.